Ralph Ellison

Ralph Waldo Ellison (1913-1994) was an American novelist, literary critic, and scholar best known for his debut novel Invisible Man (1952), which won the National Book Award in 1953 and is considered a landmark of 20th-century literature exploring race and identity. Born in Oklahoma City, he studied music at Tuskegee Institute before moving to New York, where he wrote essays like those in Shadow and Act (1964) and taught at universities including Yale and NYU. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1969 and the National Medal of Arts in 1985.